Members of the Loomis Express soccer team delivered gold medals to their trophy cases over the weekend.
The Loomis squad went undefeated to win the U11 division of Whitehorse Minor Soccer’s 2013 Toonie Tournament at the Canada Games Centre on Saturday.
Loomis took gold with a 6-5 overtime win over the Eagles in the final.
“It was a close tournament all the way through,” said Loomis coach Tim Sellars.
The final almost needed double-overtime. Loomis’s Ashton Bryant scored the game-winner just after the five-minute overtime but before the ref’s whistle. The goal was assisted by half the team with Dana Sellars, Cole Wilkie-Hobus and Joe Hanson threading the ball upfield to Bryant.
Hanson scored the his team’s other five goals.
“He was definitely an All-Star,” said Tim. “He’s a proliferate goal-scorer. He was on fire in the final.”
Following a 5-0 shut out win over Robert Service Campground to start the tournament, matches got tougher and tougher for Loomis. Loomis then won 4-2 over Coates Services and 4-3 over Soccer Shoppe.
Loomis then squeaked by Locksmith Services with a 2-1 win in the semifinal, with Hanson scoring twice to bring his team back from down 1-0.
“If it wasn’t for our goalkeeper, Zack Wirth-Richard, we’d be out,” said Tim. “He made several spectacular saves for us to have a come-from-behind victory.”
Eagles’s Ben Shier scored four goals for the Eagles in the final.
“He was the player we had to watch,” said Sellars. “We had a really hard time defending him.”
Locksmith Services went on to take bronze with a win over Soccer Shoppe.
Fourth estate team takes first
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Even with a three-goal lead, the Yukon News soccer team kept pressing.
The News went on to win 5-1 over Energy North in the U9 final of the Toonie Tournament.
Scoring goals for the Yukon News team in the final was Sydney Benoit, Simon Lauer and Hassan Rajab with three.
“He’s amazing,” said Yukon News coach Colleen Benoit of Rajab. “He’s just a little workhorse. He had good control, plays well with the team and he can really nail the ball in.”
The News went undefeated in five matches in the tournament and has only suffered one loss since the start of the season.
“We have quite a few strong players,” said Colleen. “At the start we pulled in a lot of kids who were not known to us ... They just work well with us.”
Conservation Data Centre beat Epic Pizza to snag the bronze.
“The teams work hard and it was a great showing this year,” said Colleen. “All the teams had full teams showing up. (Whitehorse Minor Soccer) normally does it in December before we break for Christmas and this was the first year they held it in January. I think it worked a bit more.”
The Whitehorse Elks galloped to gold in the U7 division with a win over the ORC Tree Services. Tim Hortons placed third, ahead of Bocelli’s Pizza.
Contact Tom Patrick at
tomp@yukon-news.com